This is an article from New York Times about bacteria in meadows and about tree of life. It makes you think of the meadow and Tree of Life fabric that is available to buy in the website, www.handpaintedquilts.com

Scientists Unveil New ‘Tree of Life’

By CARL ZIMMER
April 11, 2016

A team of scientists unveiled a new tree of life on Monday, a diagram outlining the evolution of all living things. The researchers found that bacteria make up most of life’s branches. And they found that much of that diversity has been waiting in plain sight to be discovered, dwelling in river mud and meadow soils.

“It is a momentous discovery — an entire continent of life-forms,” said Eugene V. Koonin of the National Center for Biotechnology Information, who was not involved in the study.

The study was published in the journal Nature Microbiology.

In his 1859 book “On the Origin of Species,” Charles Darwin envisioned evolution like a branching tree. The “great Tree of Life,” he said, “fills with its dead and broken branches the crust of the earth, and covers the surface with its ever branching and beautiful ramifications.”

Ever since, biologists have sought to draw the tree of life. The invention of DNA sequencing revolutionized that project, because scientists could find the relationship among species encoded in their genes.

In the 1970s, Carl Woese of the University of Illinois and his colleagues published the first “universal tree of life” based on this approach. They presented the tree as three great trunks.

Our own trunk, known as eukaryotes, includes animals, plants, fungi and protozoans. A second trunk included many familiar bacteria like Escherichia coli.

The third trunk that Woese and his colleagues identified included little-known microbes that live in extreme places like hot springs and oxygen-free wetlands. Woese and his colleagues called this third trunk Archaea.
The new tree of life that researchers published on Monday. It shows that much of Earth’s biodiversity is bacteria, top, half of which includes “candidate phyla radiation” that are still waiting to be discovered. Humans are in the bottom branch of eukaryotes.
Jill Banfield / UC Berkeley, Laura Hug / University of Waterloo

Scientists who wanted to add new species to this tree of life have faced a daunting challenge: They do not know how to grow the vast majority of single-celled organisms in their laboratories.

A number of researchers have developed a way to get around that. They simply pull pieces of DNA out of the environment and piece them together.

In recent years, Jillian F. Banfield of the University of California, Berkeley and her colleagues have been gathering DNA from many environments, like California meadows and deep sea vents. They have been assembling the genomes of hundreds of new microbial species.

The scientists were so busy reconstructing the new genomes that they did not know how these species might fit on the tree of life. “We never really put the whole thing together,” Dr. Banfield said.

Recently, Dr. Banfield and her colleagues decided it was time to redraw the tree.

They selected more than 3,000 species to study, bringing together a representative sample of life’s diversity. “We wanted to be as comprehensive as possible,” said Laura A. Hug, an author of the new study and a biologist at the University of Waterloo in Canada.

The researchers studied DNA from 2,072 known species, along with the DNA from 1,011 species newly discovered by Dr. Banfield and her colleagues.

The scientists needed a supercomputer to evaluate a vast number of possible trees. Eventually, they found one best supported by the evidence.

It’s a humbling thing to behold. All the eukaryotes, from humans to flowers to amoebae, fit on a slender twig. The new study supported previous findings that eukaryotes and archaea are closely related. But overshadowing those lineages is a sprawling menagerie of bacteria.

Remarkably, the scientists didn’t have to go to extreme places to find many of their new lineages. “Meadow soil is one of the most microbially complex environments on the planet,” Dr. Hug said.

Another new feature of the tree is a single, large branch that splits off near the base. The bacteria in this group tend to be small in size and have a simple metabolism.

Dr. Banfield speculated that they got their start as simple life-forms in the first chapters in the history of life. They have stuck with that winning formula ever since.

“This is maybe an early evolving group,” Dr. Banfield said. “Their advantage is just being around for a really long time.”

Brian P. Hedlund, a microbiologist at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas who was not involved in the new study, said that one of the most striking results of the study was that the tree of life was dominated by species that scientists have never been able to see or grow in their labs. “Most of life is hiding under our noses,” he said.

Patrick Forterre, an evolutionary biologist at the Pasteur Institute in France, agreed that bacteria probably make up much of life’s diversity. But he had concerns about how Dr. Banfield and her colleague built their tree. He argued that genomes assembled from DNA fragments could actually be chimeras, made up of genes from different species. “It’s a real problem,” he said.

Dr. Banfield predicted that the bacterial branches of the tree of life may not change much in years to come. “We’re starting to see the same things over and over again,” she said.

Instead, Dr. Banfield said she expected new branches to be discovered for eukaryotes, especially for tiny species such as microscopic fungi. “That’s where I think the next big advance might be found,” Dr. Banfield said.

Dr. Hug disagreed that scientists were done with bacteria. “I’m less convinced we’re hitting a plateau,” she said. “There are a lot of environments still to survey.”

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Here is a link and article about making an attic windows quilt with a panel. Many of the fabric panels in our fabric website would look fabulous as a landscape part of an attic windows quilt as would the tree of life fabric.

Attic Windows blocks can be great fun for interesting visual effects in a quilt. With the proper shading of colors a 3-D effect can be obtained. The large square area of the block can be used for conversation prints or novelty children’s prints to make story quilts and theme quilts. Or, use the center square for friends and family to sign for a Memory Quilt or a Signature Quilt.

Making Attic Windows quilts the traditional way means sewing inset seams on each block. But, if you don’t mind a small change in the construction you can make an Attic Windows block that looks almost like the traditional one with much easier sewing techniques. Using a Half-Square Triangle (HST) block in the corner eliminates the need for sewing those tedious inset seams.

See the diagram just below. The traditional block is on the left and the HST block is on the right.
The diagram is not showing here. Please go to the link to see it.

I’ll show you three sizes of Attic Windows blocks here with measurements for rotary cutting the pieces: 6″, 9″ and 12″ blocks.

You can use various quick sewing methods for the Half Square Triangle blocks if you will be making a quilt with many blocks at the link #3 below.

There is also a link below to show you some different ways to lay out the Attic Windows blocks in sample quilt tops.

[All images and layouts were prepared using Electric Quilt 5.0]

Continue to these pages for more information:

1. Diagrams for sizes of pieces to rotary cut for 6″, 9″ or 12″ blocks

After the quilt top had been finished, remove all the pins and other basting devices and iron out all the seams. It is now time for batting, one of the more important phases in quilting.

Batting materials

It is called by other names depending on the place where one comes from – batting, padding, or wadding. Batting is the bulk or the heft of the entire quilt project. It is the middle section of the quilt sandwich.

Depending on the style and region, batting comes in different thicknesses, compositions and textures. There are also a great number of choices of batting materials from natural fibers (cotton and wool) to synthetics and other man-made fabrics (polyester, rayon, etc).

Cotton

For most projects, cotton is the ideal batting material. It is also good for beginners because it is easy to work with and is natural. Cotton can achieve a more even look in your finished quilt.

Polyester

This is a lightweight and an inexpensive material to use. It adds puffiness in your quilt and packs well enough.

However, polyester fabrics tends to “beard” (unraveling of the fabric’s thread and weave) more than the other natural fibers.

Wool

This is one of the most ideal materials for batting. Wool is quite warm, absorbs moisture, and is perfect for use in cool and damp climates. It is flat compared to other man-made or synthetic fibers, but feels good when used in quilts.

When washing and caring for your wool-filled quilt, be sure to read and follow instructions well. (Ask some expert if you do not know how.) Wool can easily warp and change the form of your quilt in ways you will not like.

Batting thickness

Ideally, a thin light batting is very good in quilts. The advantage is that it is easier to sew compared to heavier or thicker batting.

It is important to make small and even stitches in quilts. If the batting is thinner, it is much easier for the needle and the thread to go through.

If you intend your quilt for use in your bed, and consequently, needs it for the warmth, then choose a thicker batting. Experts suggest, however, that it would probably be much easier to tie it, rather than quilt it.

Batting size

One thing to remember is to have the quilt batting bigger than the quilt top, but smaller than the backing. This allows for any pull or in cases when the quilt had already been sewn up and edges had moved and do not measure up anymore. An overlap is your insurance for any mishaps.

Never worry about left-over batting materials from previous quilts. These can be combined with the others to make a mixed piece, especially for very large quilts.

Left-over strips can be laid out side by side and carefully tacked together employing some loose stitches.

These left-over strips of fabric should at least be a fourth in terms of size to the actual quilt it will be used for. Anything smaller would be too much work in terms of piecing them together to come up with the correct size.

It is not advisable, either, to overlap the batting because it can produce a double thickness more than you intend. Plus, it will be difficult to quilt.

The boom in quilting as a hobby and craft has caused manufacturers to produce a huge variety of thread. Yet you’ll find there is such a wide selection of thread that choosing thread for your quilting project can leave you scratching your head in puzzlement. You’ll find an array of choices, whether you shop at a brick and mortar store on the internet. This article will shed some light on the confusing selection of thread for quilting.

Thread for quilting falls broadly into two categories- sewing thread and thread for embellishing. Let’s discuss sewing thread first, as it is the most commonly used. Sewing thread can be purchased in several different weights and fibers. Weights of thread can range from 28 to 60. Thread for quilting needs to be strong, and to stand the test of time, so generally you will want to choose a thread in the range of a 40 weight. Thread in the 28 weight range is most commonly used for embellishment, while 50 weight would be used for piecing. You can easily find the weight of the thread you are considering by reading the label. You may see a number like this: 40/2. The first number is the weight of the thread, the second the number of plies. In this example, the thread is a 40 weight of two plies.

Thread for quilting is most often made from cotton, rayon, polyester, metallic or plastic. The metallic and plastic thread will be used for embellishments and specialty stitches only. Cotton thread is common, and often it is mercerized. This is a process where the fiber has been made to swell and straighten out repeatedly, which removes any tendency towards fuzziness, and makes for a very high luster thread. Cotton thread is available in 30 to 60 weight.

Rayon thread is also highly lustrous, and polyester thread has a colorfast, non-shrinkable finish. The metallic thread choices are going to be a bit more difficult to sew with and are not for beginners, though they make for stunningly beautiful finished quilting projects. Some brands that quilters might want to look for include the old favorite Coats and Clark, Guterman, which is a popular alternative known for its strength and ease of use (try it for hand quilting), Madeira rayon thread, which is strong enough to use to embroider on denim or leather, and Mettler, which comes in several different fibers.

It is often not a good idea to attempt to use up old sewing thread, which tends to degenerate on the spool. Unreel a bit and pull on it. If the thread snaps, it will also snap when you put it in your sewing machine. With the wide variety of quilting thread, and its relatively low cost, there’s no reason not to just buy new thread when you need a different color. You’ll save a fortune in frustration alone.

Some manufacturers also produce special threads for embellishing, and you can find these at your local quilting store. If you like to quilt by hand, you can use embroidery floss, available in a multitude of color and fiber. Learning about the different kinds of thread can enhance your love of the craft of quilting. Hope all this information is useful.